- cross-posted to:
- news@thelemmy.club
- cross-posted to:
- news@thelemmy.club
Summary
Elon Musk called Social Security a “Ponzi scheme” on “The Joe Rogan Experience,” claiming it’s unsustainable due to long-term obligations exceeding tax revenue.
Critics, including Sen. Bernie Sanders, accused him of pushing privatization to benefit the wealthy. Musk also made false claims about Social Security mispayments.
His comments come amid looming Social Security cuts and restructuring. The Social Security Administration warns of potential fund shortages by 2035.
Democrats advocate for raising the tax cap on high earners to strengthen the program.
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The 2025 earnings tax cap for social security is $176k.
If those richest among us, like Elon who makes billions per year, had to pay social security tax on a larger percentage of their earnings, or on all of it like those of us making less than $176k annually, the system would easily be solvent in perpetuity. The only reason it’s potentially at risk is because rich assholes have lobbied successfully in order to not pay into it.
SSA publishes some cool solvency estimates for proposed policy changes. It looks like for payroll taxes, though eliminating the taxable maximum helps, some payroll tax rate increase is needed to sustain it long-term.
What is their counter argument, would it increase the velocity of money and inflation, raising interest rates for everyone and inhibiting economic growth? Or would it be that we’d need to raise capital gains taxes, which would cause US investment to flee?
The argument is it’s not a tax or insurance but a communal retirement fund meant to supplement private retirement benefits or keep the elderly out of poverty. It’s limited in what it pays out so your investment should be limited at the same place
People who earn $176k get the highest benefit, and they don’t get anymore no matter how much more they earn. They’re not getting more so don’t think they should pay in more.
I don’t know how the benefit is calculated but presumable if higher earners kick in more, the formula would need to change so it’s not all going back to them
Here’s my counter-argument to that:
Considering none of their companies or financial trusts would be worth anything without workers, I think we should cap the benefit at $176k and increase contributions to have no cap as a way to thank the workers. This would give people a good retirement to look forward to after a long career in service to the various institutions.
Further, if some of them still have billions after 4 years of this updated social security investment policy, we should make being so illegal and kill off the billionaires by applying a wealth tax until they’re just regular old millionaires. This would fund the now desperately needed infrastructure projects to keep the country safe and modernized.
It’s a free market so they’d be welcome to solely do business in Russia or the Cayman Islands or something, if they’d prefer.
There is no real counterargument, because they don’t need one.
Oh, so SS is a ponzi scheme now? Well then, I hope you do something about that, Musk. And then I’d like my tens of thousands of dollars that were taken from my paycheck back, please. After all, if I paid into the system and I haven’t used any benefits yet since I’m not at retirement age, you should be able to pay me back after you seek recompense from all the “mispayments” going on, right?
This is the billionaire class trying to do a rug pull. Don’t believe their accusations of fraud and abuse, they’re doing anything they can except raise taxes on the wealthy to pay for it. It’s your money. You paid faithfully into the system. If they mismanaged the funds by borrowing against it to fuel military quagmires all around the world, that’s a “them” problem. Hold the government accountable and do not let them cancel your retirement entitlements.
Elon Musk called Social Security a “Ponzi scheme” on “The Joe Rogan Experience,” claiming it’s unsustainable due to long-term obligations exceeding tax revenue.
Being a Ponzi scheme requires fraud. In a Ponzi scheme, the fraudster fraudulently claims that an investor is making a larger return than he is, then – for a while – pays him back from future investments from other investors. It is intrinsically unsustainable.
Social Security isn’t fraudulent. It states explicitly that people contributing to Social Security are providing the funds to people who are withdrawing from it. It may not be sustainable to maintain a fixed level of benefits at a fixed level of taxation if the fertility rate is declining, but the lack of sustainability isn’t what makes a Ponzi scheme a Ponzi scheme. It’s the presence of fraud, which does not exist for Social Security.
I remember that the Social Security Administration website used to have a page up explicitly describing why it wasn’t a Ponzi scheme.
Conservatives think the government should be run like a business. You’re not buying or selling anything, the point is to serve the people you fucks.
How should it be run, like a Keynesian, an MMT, a monetarist, something else?
MMT is how it’s currently run, and that’s fine if we didn’t schizophrenically fuck up that path every four years by trying to pretend taxes pay for spending like a business.
Realistically, though, the government should just distribute the resources necessary for life, utilizing whatever means necessary to obtain and redistribute those resources equally without harming anyone’s basic human rights.
Money, currency, etc is for trading with outside forces. That’s what it was developed for. Trade with people you don’t trust. For the majority of human history local economies ran entirely without currency being involved, with it only being needed for trade. It was fine, it was better locally.
We can even more easily implement a sharing or trust based local economy now that computers are a thing, and we can easily distribute and equalize necessary resources for the same reason.
Except then you couldn’t obtain capital, and couldn’t rent things. And without rent you can’t become obscenely rich. So we can’t have that.
Personally, I am starting to think a nation should have ‘internal’ and ‘external’ currencies. The latter is for engaging in trade between nations and corporations. The internal currency is just to optimize the supply and demand of things between citizens, corporations, and the government, but the income is fixed. This theoretically would prevent inflation, since income doesn’t change for even the most wealthiest members of society.
By doing it this way, the internal currency can have different rules and values from the exterior. What I have in mind is a ‘wealth band’ of sorts, using Universal Ranked Income to make income fixed for a job class. There can be absolute caps on wealth, at $100k for income, savings, and assets. Something like the following:
“Full self-driving”
You know what, if they destroy Social Security just because Musk said so, I have no doubt there will be blood. Too many people from too many demographics in too many places rely on it just to SURVIVE, let alone abuse it in any meaningful way.
This would honestly be one of, if not the fastest ways to spark a civil war, outside of rolling troops into major cities and opening fire. Why? Because you’d suddenly have millions of people unable to feed themselves, in a country where there are significantly more guns than people, and they’d all have ample cause to march on DC.
THAT SAID, I doubt Musk and Trump have thought of that, because they’re 2 drug-addled lunatics who do not and never have cared about long-term ramifications. I’m sure other Republicans are shitting themselves in fear right now, as the Dipshit Duo get ready to kill the Political Golden Goose, but none of them can speak up for fear of losing power.
What a fucking mess.
Yeah, that would be the last nail in the coffin of me ever being able to retire so I’d have nothing left to live for at that point and I would be able to dip into enough savings to make myself a problem.
Remember, when they say Musk is a “”“Billionaire Genius”“”, THIS is who they’re talking about. A raging Ketamine addict with a massive ego problem.
I mean, in a way he’s not wrong. The money gets funneled from all of us all the way to the top.
But the thing is, the money does get distributed - all of it. The Ponzi at the top is us again, stealing from it to pay for infrastructure or defense spending.
And that is fine because that type of scheme with a large moat is called insurance. And so long as we can continue to pay out distributions, it is solvent.
But it isn’t solvent, because premiums haven’t kept up with payouts and the payouts for the baby boomers are massive. And if we don’t take some kind of action (e.g. increased premiums, disqualification for the rich, increase the benefit age) then payouts will eventually need to decrease.
Actually, the remedy Social Security needs is to remove the income cap. Elon Musk pays just as much into social security as I do: ~$10,900
It’s because there’s a cap: $176,100. Once you earn that much in income you don’t have to pay into social security anymore! It’s ridiculous!
Basically, the richer you are, the less you’re paying into social security as a percentage of your income. It’s the opposite of progressive (just like HSAs).
Remove the cap and people like Musk will be paying millions into Social Security every year. It’ll make it solvent again in no time at all.
That’s exactly why the Republicans have been trying to dismantle it. The only solution that’s not going to get you voted out of office is the one that gets your reelection funding cut off.
Yeah no, he’s wrong. Government is not a for-profit venture. When you are providing services to citizens, it’s not a scam.
And a very merry fuel subsidy to you as well.
I mean, this system only works if we keep reproducing 2.5:1 factor. I don’t want to condemn anyone to this world, so he is right. And with the birth rates lowering this is gonna be a serious problem, for most zoomers and alphas.
We could increase immigration.
Joe Rogan is watched mostly by young people, many of which are also too young to realize that cutting social security means they’re going to spend a good chunk of their adult life taking care of their parents until they die. That means paying for their housing or living facility, or having them live with you.
Reaching these young people to get this across to them is the tricky part.
Just let your parents starve to death on the street. Duh.
Care facilities are crazy expensive, too. You think rent is bad? Try $7000 per month. The national average for a care facility is $9000.
Alternative headline: expert on ponzi schemes bemoans what he sees as competition
The favorite dumb argument from the guys who constantly defraud governments via tax dodging and subsidies.
Despicable thief and con man.
It’s one of the most popular social programs in American history. It’s also OUR FUCKING MONEY ELON.
Popular… except i have grown up being told that ss was something i paid into but would not be available for me.
Does he feel like way about all pension programs or just the ones he is trying to plunder?
Yes
If Musk dislikes “Ponzi schemes,” maybe start by rejecting government subsidies for his ventures.
🐱🐱
No no no, not like that. - Moscow musk
His bullshit he’s spouting isn’t even true. US life expectancy hasn’t even increased at all over the past 20 years, and has only gone up by like 7 years over the past 50 and they’ve increased retirement age since then.
Yep. It’d be inconvenient for them to note that the funding issues are primarily driven by increasing concentration of income which falls above the Social Security withholding cap. If they’d just remove that cap, then no issue.
Social security is never going to “run out” it’s continuously funded, that’s how it works. America lacks curiosity and an attention span beyond a couple seconds. Conservatives loudly accuse (while projecting), demand detailed explanation and then immediately become disinterested in the explanation they demanded - mostly because they can’t comprehend the basic concepts and their eyes glaze over. For the most part they are unserious, homicidal and suicidal and just looking for an excuse to have an outburst.
Don’t let them leech your energy trying to explain or debate. They don’t know or care what you are talking about.
It can run out if the amount if money being distributed exceeds the amount of money being collected. Such as when there are a large number of retirees (the “baby boomer” generation is much larger then the one preceeding it) or fewer workers (eg. if immigration slows or birthrates drop).
The point is that it won’t. Your internet could turn off next month if you don’t pay your fucking bill… But you pay your FUCKING bill. There’s no validity in your position. It’s an OLD right wing propaganda talking point - you’re either ignorant of that or complicit in it. Either way, do better.
It’s basic economics, if our population declines (either because people have less babies or immigration declines; both of which are currently happening) there will be less money going in to social security. While that’s happening, the number of retirees is greatly increasing.
In terms of your internet service analogy, this is like losing your job at the same time your internet rates get raised. You can’t pay your bills if you don’t have any money.
It’s basic BAD FAITH economics. Your point about “less money going in” is a self fulfilling prophecy by the GOP - They dismantle finding sources for the social safety net programs actively and then loudly complain that those programs are doomed.
In the “America great again” years that the lead poisoned boomers are longing for, we had income tax for the highest earners around 90%. So Reagan, bushes and trump give out huge tax cuts to the wealthy, gut the IRS so that money isn’t coming in and then ignorant and/or deceptive little foot soldiers like yourself rush in to carry water for the lie and try to create fact through repetition. You are wrong, period, end of story. The only Epsom is of you ate being used and are unaware or if you are willingly perpetuating this bullshit in bad faith.
Your bad position is SO played out in fact, that here is a clip that is a decade old explaining how you are wrong and trying to prop up an old, tired lie. https://youtu.be/k3dK-z9F4C0
Shame on you, bud. You seem smart enough to know better.
You’re making a strawman argument. I never said social security couldn’t (or shouldn’t) be saved. Nor did I argue that the Republicans aren’t at fault for its problems. Obviously raising taxes to increase the amount of money going in to social security would fix the budget issues.
Your posts give a real “old man yelling at clouds” vibe
Your posts give a real “Publicly arguing technicalities for the sake of it in furtherance of the downfall of modern society on behalf of oligarchs with an end game to kill off poor people and refine their bodies into biodiesel” vibe.
You don’t seem to understand that your lack of that stated context of good or bad alongside your defense is very telling. Quit doing work for the bad guys, or if you continue, have the balls to openly count yourself among their ranks.
“My defense?” “The bad guys?” You’re being very adversarial, and I’m not sure why you keep trying to make me your enemy. Posting on Lemmy isn’t good for anything except venting, and if you want to be a keyboard warrior you should find a community where conservatives gather. You still won’t be doing anything productive, but at least Lemmy will be a little more peaceful.
